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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27012298">Death; Destiny</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/PersonyPepper/pseuds/PersonyPepper'>PersonyPepper</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst with a Happy Ending, Curses, Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia Has Feelings, Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia Loves Jaskier | Dandelion, Getting Together, Hurt Jaskier | Dandelion, Immortal Jaskier | Dandelion, Jaskier | Dandelion Loves Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia, M/M, Past Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Poetic, Post-Episode: S01E06 Rare Species, Soulmates, brief mention of attempted suicide, ig</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-10-14</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-10-14</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-07 02:07:20</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,919</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27012298</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/PersonyPepper/pseuds/PersonyPepper</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>I tell him he’s a shit-shoveler, that I wish Life would take him off my hands though I want anything but. </i>
</p><p>
  <i>But he will die, and he will die knowing he loved a mutant, a monster that will live forever beyond him. He will die knowing he wasted his measly sixty years of life on following me around if I let him stay, and I cannot let him die with that regret.</i>
</p><p> </p><p>Or, Geralt means well, but it takes him three-hundred years to realize how wrong he was.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>24</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>303</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Death; Destiny</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <em>I’m thinking about death today.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Not that it ever leaves my mind, with my hands as red as they are. But today, I’m thinking of it willingly. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>Jaskier wore red today. He looked beautiful, his hair mussed in the wind; he’d laugh if I told him how pretty I find him. I laugh sometimes, because it’s ridiculous. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>I love him. I love him, and it hurts to know that I’m destined to lose him. A child of surprise to Vesemir, to Kaer Morhen— fate decided long ago that I’d lose him. Lose the clear brightness in his eyes to foggy morning light, lose his lively chatter to pin-drop silence. I’m thinking of death today. I’m thinking of his death. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>Yennefer left me atop that mountaintop. Rightfully so. But she wouldn’t have died, not now, not ever. Why must Lady Destiny be so cruel as to drive away the only person I could spend eternity with without pain? </em>
</p><p>
  <em>Well, that’s not quite true, either. We were terrible for one another. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>And Jaskier isn’t. I’m terrible to him— I can’t let him any closer. For one day, he will lay limp in my arms, whether it be with blood that trickles down his wound or wrinkled hands that grip around mine… he will die. Like every Roach before him, and every Roach after. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>He wears that red so beautifully. He deserves someone to tell him that, that person isn’t me, it can’t be me. It can’t be me who kisses him till he’s got no distinction between up and down, who holds him till he’s dizzy and laughing… no, it can’t be me. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>So I tell him—</em>
</p><p>
  <em>I tell him it isn’t him. That it will never be him no matter how I want it to be. He’ll never be my friend, my lover much less, and he cries though he tries not to, his heart beats double-time with my words, though I can hear it shatter in his chest.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>That beautiful heart that will never be mine, that can’t ever be mine. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>I tell him he’s a shit-shoveler, that I wish Life would take him off my hands though I want anything but. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>But he will die, and he will die knowing he loved a mutant, a monster that will live forever beyond him. He will die knowing he wasted his measly sixty years of life on following me around if I let him stay, and I cannot let him die with that regret. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>I tell him he’s the worst thing that has ever happened to me. I tell him that every ill that has occurred is his fault, and I hear his heart split and bleed in his chest with every word. Never mind, it will heal. It always does.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>I turn my back to him, his youthful face imprinted in my mind, and I watch the blood sun set behind towering mountains as I listen to him walk away from me. </em>
</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>
  <em>I see him. I see him again, there in that corner with an ale. He holds his mug close, as if it’s the last of his friends, and chugs it with vehemence and hatred. My potatoes will grow cold if I do not eat them soon, but there is Jaskier—</em>
</p><p>
  <em>—a hundred years later—</em>
</p><p>
  <em>—looking as if he’s but twenty years of age. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>His eyes are bloodshot, and his hands shake from drink, but there isn’t a wrinkle on his face. The laughter lines around his eyes are long-faded, and he is pale. A mimicry of the man he once used to be. He is either a doppler, a terrible one at that, or hundred years have taken a toll on him. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>I hear him order another drink, no flare behind his words. No, it’s certainly him, he is less himself than a doppler would be. His voice, despite its coarseness soothes me. I’d though him long, long dead, had mourned him without realizing. His heart beats in that odd rhythm of his, and he taps his foot along to the pitiful bardlet screeching in the corner; it’s him.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>He’s alive. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>What to do now, what to do next— I’ll order a plate of honeycakes. The only thing he’ll hesitate throwing at me, honeycakes. He hasn’t noticed me yet, not as I walk towards him with my ale in one hand and the sweets in the other— my stomach is a mess of… of something. Something I haven’t felt before, or at least, haven’t felt in a long time. Perhaps it’s nervousness. Fear, even. I choose not to dwell on it as I sit down in the booth opposite to him, and set down the plate in front of him. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>His eyes are unfocused, as if he can’t see me. Won’t see me. It takes all my bravery to keep from diverting my eyes in shame. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>“You’re alive,” I say at last. He’s a mockery of the youthful face I’ve had imprinted in my mind, his eyes empty with heartbreak, his posture relaxed almost slouching.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>He twists his lips into a brief, dry smile, and I hate it. I’ve never hated anything more than the blank look on his face. How defeated he looks, how tired. Have I ever known Jaskier to look tired? </em>
</p><p>
  <em>“I am,” he says. His voice is hoarse, as if he’s been crying for the last hundred years, or as if he hasn’t spoken at all. “Sorry.” <br/>
</em>
</p><p>
  <em>I must be the biggest fool on the continent. To not only push him away, but to destroy him in the process. </em>
</p><p><em>“No,”</em> <em>how do I fix this, “It’s— hm.” Jaskier’s laugh is hollow, coppery as if he bleeds with the sound.</em></p><p>
  <em>“Jaskier, I thought you were dead.”</em>
</p><p>
  <em>“Not for a lack of trying.” The words leave me cold. “Goodbye, Geralt.”<br/>
</em>
</p><p>
  <em>He’s standing, and I’m watching him leave. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>There’s no blood sun accompanying his footsteps this time around, save for the yellow honeycakes that sit untouched on the table before me. </em>
</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>
  <em>He sits far too close to the edge, legs kicking over the side of the cliff. Roach huffs in excitement, but ‘not now,’ I tell her, ‘not now.’ She settles as if she knows. She’s always been smarter than me. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>Summer grass flattens under the weight of my boot as I walk towards him. He’s too close, and a strong wind could push him off and into the churning sea against rock I hear over the side.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>“I was cursed as a babe,” he calls out. He looks out into the sea, waiting for me to come sit next to him. I throw my legs over the edge of the cliff, and my feet tingle at the height. Witchers are made to be fearless, but human instinct is not so easily squashed, persistent through torture and agony.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Jaskier kicks his legs, nonchalant.<br/>
</em>
</p><p>
  <em>“With?” I ask. There is color in his cheeks, red from the sun, and he looks to have put back some of the weight onto his bones. Good. He looks good. Less of a dead man walking than when I last saw him.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>His body is warm against mine though we barely touch; I hadn’t realize how much I’ve missed him till now, with the two of us sitting shoulder to shoulder and gazing out into the endless blue. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>“Immortality.” The corner of his lip quirks in memory of a smile past, “Or something close enough: I was cursed to have my lifetime bound with the person I fell in love with.” He lays down in the grass, knobby fingers resting on his chest; he’s beautiful, unfairly so with his windswept hair curling and soft with sea-mist. His eyes are forlorn, and I wonder again what evils and pain he’s seen. And how much of it I inflicted upon him with my stupidity. <br/>
</em>
</p><p>
  <em>“That doesn’t seem like much of a curse,” I tell him. I can hear his heart rabbit in his chest, and what a delightful sound it is. My bard, alive, beside me. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>“It isn’t if your lover loves you back.” I prop myself up on my elbow, stare down at him. It can’t be, but ‘practical immortality?’ and ‘curse?’ What else could it be but a curse to love me? </em>
</p><p>
  <em>Jaskier’s are closed; he looks peaceful resting here, and all of a sudden, I remember the image of red dripping from wounds, the image wrinkled hands holding mind— and I realize—</em>
</p><p>
  <em>And I realize. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>My heartbeat plays staccato in my chest and he is so close, so close to me, so close to my heart. A little closer—</em>
</p><p>
  <em>—our lips meet.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Bliss, as if I’ve been addicted to Jaskier’s kiss though I’ve never felt it; bliss, as if I know Elysium after eons in Tartarus; bliss, like a haggard witcher who’s finally found his bard. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>Jaskier kisses back, his lips chapped and his eyes closed. The grass is soft under my palm as I twist to kiss him more, kiss him better— years of denial, only for all my supposed heartlessness to fall, and my love to be exposed in an instant; what a fool I was, what a fool. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>I realize belatedly that tears slip out from Jaskier’s closed eyes, and he pulls away from me. “I can’t do this again, dear witcher,” he whispers. Dear witcher. How I’ve ached to be called such thing. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>“Do what? I won’t make you do anything, Jaskier,” I would promise him the world if it meant he’d stay by my side. “What is it?” <br/>
</em>
</p><p>
  <em>He blinks up at me; cornflower blues swim with tears, turbulent and violent and beautiful and loving, much too similar to the sea that roars beneath us. “Love you. I cannot love you again—” how selfish I’ve been, assuming Jaskier would come back to me after all the ill I’ve done and said, how naive to give him such little credit— “Yennefer lives. And there are so many Yennefers, are there not?”</em>
</p><p>
  <em>“There are,” I understand his words, “Hundreds of powerful sorceresses, wizards— bards, even.” He hums, eyes closed, and I smile at how similar the sound is to mine. “But there is only one Jaskier,” he opens his eyes, and they shine with patient, hesitant hope, “and there is only one Geralt.” He sobs, and my heart stutters in worry, ‘have I done wrong again? Have I hurt him more with my words?’ I straighten, an apology on the edge of my tongue. This was a mistake. I was stupid to think—</em>
</p><p>
  <em>I’m dragged down by my collar. Our lips are inches apart, and he looks into my eyes and I look into his. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>“You will not hurt me? You will love me?” <br/>
</em>
</p><p>
  <em>I nod. I promise.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>“I am still in pain. Three-hundred years later, and I am still in pain.” <br/>
</em>
</p><p>
  <em>“I will heal you. I will love you, because—” to have the words catch in his throat now is comical, “because I do love you. I always have. I was frightened you would die, that you would regret your short life spent beside me.” <br/>
</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Jaskier laughs, a sobbing, wet thing that sounds joyous and free, “You’re an idiot. An honest-to-Melitele moron.” </em>
</p><p>
  <em>“That I am,” I agree. “That I am.” <br/>
</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Jaskier pulls me an inch closer, and we kiss. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>We kiss, and we kiss till the sea grows violent with the rise of the moon, and the blush red sun sets behind the horizon. We kiss, and we kiss, and we love. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>We love till our hands grow wrinkled in harmony, and for far longer after that.</em>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Let me know what you thought! </p><p>I don't post all my works to a03 because I can't keep up with it, so come check out my tumblr lol @persony-pepper</p></blockquote></div></div>
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